International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology

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Mother tongue as a universal human right

Christine De Luca

To cite this article: Christine De Luca (2018) Mother tongue as a universal human
right, International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 20:1, 161-165, DOI:
10.1080/17549507.2017.1392606

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International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 2018; 20: 161–165

I N V I T E D C OM ME N TA RY

Mother tongue as a universal human right

CHRISTINE DE LUCA

Edinburgh, UK

Abstract
Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights enshrines the right to freedom of opinion and expression. UN
Resolution A/RES/61/266 called upon Member States ‘‘to promote the preservation and protection of all languages used by
peoples of the world’’. This resolution has particular relevance for minority language groups where mother tongue – so vital
to self-expression – is primarily a spoken medium, often ascribed low status. With few fluent readers and writers, and a
consequent dearth of written resources, a vicious circle develops and linguistic and cultural heritage erodes. Not all
governments are vigilant with appropriate policies and funding. Even in a community like Shetland, where there is no class
connotation associated with speaking Shetlandic, the proportion of fluent dialect speakers is now relatively small. It
therefore falls to the writer to create resources for children, to help stem the tide. Engaging in translation can also help raise
the status of dialect and pinpoint the somewhat arbitrary distinction between dialect and language. There are many problems
in publishing in minority tongues; for example, uneconomic print runs, language authenticity versus contemporaneity,
standardisation of orthography and the trend to ‘‘exotic-ise’’ dialect in mainstream literature.

Keywords: Article 19; Universal Declaration of Human Rights; United Nations; mother tongue; multilingual; bilingual;
dialect

Mother tongue as a universal human right
Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (United Nations, 1948) enshrines the right to
freedom of opinion and expression. UN Resolution
A/RES/61/266 called upon Member States ‘‘to
promote the preservation and protection of all
languages used by peoples of the world’’ (United
Nations, 2007, p. 4). This resolution has particular
relevance for minority language groups where
mother tongue is primarily a spoken medium,
often ascribed low status. UNESCO (2017) states
‘‘Local languages, especially minority and indigen-
ous, transmit cultures, values and traditional know-
ledge, thus playing an important role in promoting
sustainable futures.’’ (n.p.)
Not only does the recognition of the value of one’s
mother tongue help develop a sense of pride in it, it
can help promote an attitude of mind towards other
cultures and tongues, as being due a reciprocal
respect. The United Nations also states
All moves to promote the dissemination of mother
tongues will serve not only to encourage linguistic
diversity and multilingual education but also to develop
fuller awareness of linguistic and cultural traditions
throughout the world and to inspire solidarity based on
understanding, tolerance and dialogue. (United
Nations, 2017, n.p.)
Early exposure to mother tongue as well as the
official language can be part of this development of
empathy before formal educations begins. I was
brought up in one such minority tongue area –
Shetland, the most northerly island group in the
United Kingdom. I write as a poet, and in this
commentary, I will use poetry ‘‘through any media
and regardless of frontiers’’ (Article 19, United
Nations, 1948), to argue for mother tongue as a
universal human right. This short poem in
Shetlandic (or Shetland dialect), Glims o origin (De
Luca, 2005a), revels in mother tongue and the
delight in teaching it to one’s child. It also touches
on the evolution and attrition of language. An
English version is added (Figure 1).
If, when a child starts formal education, that
initial language resource (this human right) is
ignored or – more damaging – treated as an inferior
dialect, children quickly sense these value judge-
ments. This is particularly problematic in areas with
small language groups and/or where there is a
sudden or relatively large influx of people speaking
the dominant tongue.

Correspondence: Christine De Luca, 17A Seton Place, Edinburgh EH9 2JT, UK. Email: deluca.c@gmail.com
ISSN 1754-9507 print/ISSN 1754-9515 online ß 2017 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original
work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
DOI: 10.1080/17549507.2017.1392606
162 C. De Luca
Glims o origin
I savoured dy aerly wirds as dey cam,
whinivver dey surprised dy mooth;
helpit shape dem wi dee, hent dem.
Foo mony generations o bairns
is quarried dat sam wirds, fun
aa needfu soonds aroond dem?
An sea-farers at laandit here
höved in, fae uncan erts, wirds
kjerried on ocean’s shiftin tides;
wave-wörn, wind-riven wirds,
der aedges shaaved aff, makkin
a meld; a tongue fit fur saga
an fur psalm. Rumse ithin hit,
hock awa, an du’ll fin veins
i da steyn, bricht glims o origin!
Figure 1. Glims o origin (De Luca, 2005a). Reprinted with permission.
Discussions of what constitutes ‘‘language’’ and
‘‘dialect’’ may be convoluted but, while they go on,
those classified as languages generally get increased
official support while those treated as dialects can
tend to wither, lacking the status and funding
associated with ‘‘language’’.
I consider myself lucky to have been brought up
in a bilingual environment, with Shetlandic a vibrant
dialect and English as our official language. We
moved effortlessly between the two, depending on
the situation. In rural Shetland at that time (mid-
twentieth century), the local linguistic resource was
rich and it was necessary to ensure children were
secure in their English so that they would not be at a
disadvantage later in life, especially as many left the
islands for higher education or employment.
Generally, English was taught as a necessary com-
munication skill, with a valuable associated literary
tradition; it was not taught in a way that encouraged
emulation of a linguistic élite, or a feeling of
inferiority of our dialect expression. We were not,
for example, encouraged to have elocution lessons;
and indeed, had we started speaking formal English
in informal situations, we would have been accused
of knappin – a dialect verb with a real pejorative feel
(i.e. to speak with affectation).
We were lucky that, generally speaking, our
mother tongue was not considered to be inferior
and, as part of our education – though reading and
writing were not taught formally – we had occasional
opportunities to learn to recite poems in Shetlandic.
No local concert was complete without some
Shetland poetry and perhaps a sketch in dialect.
This was particularly the case in rural areas. And
there were good models we could emulate: teachers
who were fluent and comfortable in both Shetlandic
and English.
Glints of origin
I savoured your early words as they came,
whenever they surprised your mouth;
helped shape them with you, gather them.
How many generations of children
have quarried those same words, found
all needful sounds around them?
And sea-farers who landed here
threw in, from unfamiliar places, words
carried on ocean’s shifting tides;
wave-worn, wind-riven words,
their edges hacked aff, making
a blend; a tongue fit for saga
and for psalm. Rummage in it,
dig away, and you’ll find veins
in the stone, bright glints of origin!
I was therefore surprised when I moved to the
Scottish mainland to find that not all communities
had that attitude to their mother tongue. Many
seemed trapped in a single way of speaking, either in
English or in Scots (which varies somewhat from one
area to another, particularly in accent). To me, for
the first time, language appeared to be used as a
strong indicator of class; and the concomitant sense
of betraying one’s class by being willing and able to
shift with ease between the two. I had not
experienced this in Shetland.
Shetlandic was, for most people, an oral culture.
We rarely had an opportunity to learn to read and
write in our mother tongue. The islands were there-
fore not well prepared for the economic shock that the
discovery of North Sea Oil brought in the 1970s, and
the sudden relatively large numbers of incomers. Even
when teachers were keen to do something to support
dialect, there were few suitable resources and no
mother tongue storybooks. School playgrounds, and
even the school gate, suddenly became places where,
noticeably, the language became English. Parents
who were fluent dialect speakers started speaking
English to their children presumably to boost the self-
confidence of their children when surrounded by non-
Shetlandic-speaking classmates and sometimes tea-
chers too. Dialect-speaking – particularly with young
people – became less common and less valued. The
human right we had taken for granted was endan-
gered as, in a policy vacuum, many parents failed to
appreciate just how important is that inter-gener-
ational mother tongue conversation.
Through the work of a voluntary body, Shetland
ForWirds, established in 2009, much work has since
been undertaken to support schools to stem the tide,
to raise confidence and to create resources. Policy-
makers eventually followed suit. Teachers are now

encouraged to make opportunities for children to
read and write in Shetlandic. However, time in the
curriculum is tight and many teachers, though
willing, lack the necessary fluency and literacy.
One important support for raising or maintaining
the status of dialect in such situations is the existence
of an expanding contemporary literature for children
and adults. This seems to be crucial in ensuring that
speakers of the dialect can feel a real sense of identity
and pride when using it for their various communi-
cations, whether in a literary context or informally. In
relation to adults, Shetland has a relatively small
literature on which to build, starting from the early
nineteenth century. Since 1947 this has been nurtured
by the quarterly journal The New Shetlander,
(Voluntary Action Shetland, 2017) a valuable organ
for publishing stories and poems in Shetlandic, as well
as cultural articles. It has recently made a real effort to
publish dialect writing by young people.
Many bemoan the current state of dialect speak-
ing and writing but Brian Smith, co-editor of The
New Shetlander and the local archivist, remarked in
an article about Shetland dialect (Smith, 2000)
The key evidence that Shetland dialect is in good,
challenging form is its literature. That growing body of
work reflects and portrays modern Shetland. And it
doesn’t just reflect it; it alters the way Shetlanders speak
to each other about the world and its travails.
These are encouraging words. Looking to the
future, what will help sustain Shetland dialect? It is
still spoken fairly widely, particularly by the older
generation. But as long as schools teach only in the
medium of English and have dialect merely as an
extra – when time allows – it will be difficult to raise
levels of literacy and consequently hard to encourage
a new generation of writers. However, it’s not all
bleak: the emergent use of dialect on social media is
perhaps helping younger people gain confidence in
literacy. And the good work of Shetland ForWirds
continues with competitions for young writers.
However, for writers, finding a publisher outwith
Shetland for such a minority tongue is never easy.
Yet this is an important signifier of the status of the
dialect within the country, and worth pursuing.
Writers in minority tongues often have to make
compromises if they want to be published: for
example reducing the proportion of Shetlandic to
English poems in a collection; or the commercially
more viable ‘‘Shetlandic-light’’ route (i.e. poems in
English with just a soupçon of Shetland words).
In terms of an expanding literature there are
several issues:
(1) The cost of producing children’s storybooks –
designed to look as exciting and colourful as those
written in English – is very high. Publishing small
print runs is generally not financially viable. It
requires subsidy.
(2) Natural language attrition (words becoming obsolete)
over the years as a by-product of economic change
Mother tongue as a universal human right 163
can result in what is an authentic tongue to older
readers feeling somewhat archaic to younger readers.
(3) Variation (not untypical) across the islands in pro-
nunciation. While this demonstrates linguistic vitality
it is apt to make it more difficult to settle on
orthography. Vowel sounds in particular can vary
considerably from one community to another.
However, readers impose their own pronunciation,
irrespective of the writer’s spelling. The question is
therefore, given the need to increase literacy levels for
the future, can we trade a bit of authentic sound for
consistency and ease of reading? There are several
dictionaries, for example Graham (1979), and a
grammar (Robertson & Graham, 1952), which sup-
port in this area.
(4) There is a modern trend, possibly as writers in the
western world travel ever more widely to more
inaccessible places, to treat minority tongues as exot-
ica; vocabulary as cultural artefacts which can add a
certain piquancy to their own creative writing. I would
argue that when the dialect borrowed is spoken by a
very small language group and is endangered for
whatever reason (and there are many), and then, there
is a responsibility to examine one’s motives for so
doing. If it is necessary to the meaning of the poem
(e.g. there is no direct equivalent word, or the poem is
about the concept embodied in the word), or it is
included to bring attention to the riches of the minority
tongue, then the use seems to have integrity. In such
cases the word can usefully be italicised or at least
glossed as a mark of respect for the minority tongue. If
however it is merely used, un-italicised or un-glossed,
to make the poem stand out in the general market place
of contemporary literature or as part of playful game of
words – while that may be fun for poet and non-native
reader – such language appropriation can feel patron-
ising and somewhat neo-colonial to those whose
language it is and whose heritage it embodies. To
them it is not exotic at all. Others no doubt would
challenge this view; perhaps see it as ‘‘precious’’.
I would contend that everything we do should be
to enhance our mother tongue, retain its authenticity
and build it up so that access to a rich linguistic
heritage remains a worthwhile right to hand on to
succeeding generations.
This brings me back to the importance of
ensuring young people never succumb to the
notion that their mother tongue is a debased
language; indeed, to the whole issue of the categor-
isation of language versus dialect.
I have been privileged over the years to have been
given opportunities to undertake translation pro-
jects, most typically with Nordic poets. Working with
these poets, I could see that the distinction between
‘‘language’’ and ‘‘dialect’’ was somewhat arbitrary:
Norwegians who speak the majority language
(Bokmål) are understood by Danes and Swedes.
Yet there is no doubt that these are considered to be
languages. And poets from these language groups
could understand my poems written in Shetlandic
using both their familiarity with their own languages
and with English. They described it as a ‘‘cousin’’
164 C. De Luca

language. They also noted that, given their fluency
in English, they were surprised just how different
was the grammar and vocabulary of Shetlandic from
English. These encounters encouraged me, not just
in translation per se, but more broadly in my writing.
I became more aware of the political and linguistic
importance of mother tongue and also less anxious
about the distinction between ‘‘dialect’’ and ‘‘lan-
guage’’. I tend to use the terms ‘‘Shetland dialect’’
and ‘‘Shetlandic’’ interchangeably to represent this
fluidity. It is incumbent on us to build up that
literature. Professor Alan Riach, recently writing for
The National newspaper (23/9/2016), offered an
alternative to the usual belief ‘‘A language is a dialect
with an army and navy’’ – he stated ‘‘A language is a
dialect with a literature.’’ (p. 27).
Every effort must be made to ensure that our
mother tongue has a future; that children have
opportunities not only to hear stories in Shetlandic
but to handle books and learn to read and write in it
as well and to feel proud of it. The poem Spelling it
out (De Luca, 2014a, 2014b), Figure 2, starts off in
English but while writing it I just could not keep
hold of it. But we have to be inventive. Writers can
revitalise decaying vocabulary through figurative use
and in the context of abstract ideas. Poets perhaps
have a particular responsibility in this area.
We could say we do not need these words and
expressions any more, and that is true; but some-
times we are careless. One story comes to mind.
When I was perhaps seven or eight years old, I
remember an old lady asking me ‘‘His du a
calaphine?’’ I was perplexed by the request ‘‘Do
you have a . . .?’’ Later, when I asked my mother
what a calaphine was she was surprised I did not
know that it was a pencil. One generation used the
word, the next generation knew it but did not use it
and the third generation (me) did not know it. Yet

Spelling it out

It’s the way a cat fawns, a bird flaunts,

a dog recoils and whimpers; it’s the way
a cricket chooses from his bag of chirpings
or a whale sends a long distance message.

It’s the way our fore-fathers moved

to the forest floor, and in the tonality
of their vocal chords said ‘I’ and ‘you’
in a thousand different ways; picked up

the grammar of polemic and persuasion,

the lexicon of lewd and lovely,
the tenses that made sense
of time past and time to come.

It’s the borders, armies and classes

that cornered the limits of Language:
Patois or Pidgin; Colloquial or Kailyard;
Vernacular or Slang.

It’s the famous thesaurus that suggests

three meanings for dialect – other than
dialect and language – speciality,
unintelligibility and speech defect.

It’s the funding that flows from decisions;

it’s the boundaries and commissions
that decide that pub is kosher in Norwegian,
but only if pronounced püb;

dat Heron Heights an Hegrehøyden

is baith languages but Hegri-heichts is dialect,
dat Hrossagaukur an Snipe is language
but Horsegock is dialect.

Hit’s da passion we hadd whin we nön ta wirsels,

whin we bal soond fae wir bosie inta da heevens
whin we lay a wird o love apön een anidder
whin we dunna budder wi nairrow definition.

____________________________________________________________________
dat: that; hadd: hold; nön: hum quietly; bal: throw; bosie: bosom; een anidder:
one another; dunna budder wi: ignore

Figure 2. Spelling it out (De Luca, 2014a, 2014b). Reprinted with permission.

Yarbent
i m my Aunt Ella
You took time ta mak sure I’d goen
ivery tirl, ivery whenk o da wird
you’d used: dat een I’d aksed aboot.
Sic a owld wird hit soondit: ‘yarbent’.
I can still see you luik ta Mousa*, say
‘Weel, hit’s a boo o wadder fae da sooth-aest,
laid on herd an dry, no lik ta shift,
maybe roond voar, or eftir hairst.’
Der a yarbent seled apön me fae you gud:
sic a peerie wird, but nirse. A’ll varg
i da face o him, an keep i da mind’s eye,
as you wir wint tae, da bigger pictir.
*Mousa – an island off east coast of Shetland
Figure 3. Yarbent (De Luca, 2005b). Reprinted with permission.
there was a word with a long pedigree, linked to
calligraphy. And the pencil is still a useful tool!
The loss of older relatives often means the loss of
a repository of rich language. With aunts and uncles
spread across Shetland, as a child I heard many
words and idioms, many of which would be unfamil-
iar today. The poem in Figure 3, Yarbent (De Luca,
2005b), is about one such word, still relevant though
perhaps in different contexts.
So our linguistic human right needs wise and
dedicated stewardship if its richness and cultural
distinctiveness is to survive and be worth passing on.
It so perfectly fits the landscape, the seascape, the
stories, the fabric of society, the moods, emotions
and attitudes of its people. We need to continue to
find practical ways of ensuring it is considered an
important asset for succeeding generations.
Declaration of interest
There are no real or potential conflicts of interest
related to the manuscript.
References
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De Luca, C. (2005b). Yarbent. In C. De Luca. Parallel worlds
(p. 23). Edinburgh, UK: Luath Press.
Mother tongue as a universal human right 165
Yarbent
i m my Aunt Ella
You took time to make sure I’d understood
every twist, every odd movement of the word
you’d used: that one I’d asked about.
It sounded such an old word: ‘yarbent’.
I can still see you look to Mousa*, say
‘Well, it’s a spell of weather from the south-east,
laid on hard and dry, not likely to shift,
maybe round Spring planting, or after harvest.’
There’s a yarbent seled on me since you went:
such a small word, but bier. I’ll toil
in the face of it, and keep in the mind’s eye,
as you were used to, the bigger picture.
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